Marc LiVecche

Marc LiVecche (PhD, University of Chicago) is the McDonald Distinguished Scholar of Ethics, War, and Public Life at Providence. He is also a non-resident research fellow at the US Naval War College, in the College of Leadership and Ethics and adjunct professor of ethics at the US Naval Academy.

Marc completed doctoral studies, earning distinction, at the University of Chicago, where he worked under the supervision of the political theorist and public intellectual Jean Bethke Elshtain, until her death in August, 2013. His first book, The Good Kill: Just War & Moral Injury, was published in 2021 by Oxford University Press. He has co-edited, both with Eric Patterson, Responsibility and Restraint: James Turner Johnson and the Just War Tradition, published by Stone Tower Press and Military Necessity and Just War Statecraft, published by Routledge. Currently, he is finalizing Moral Horror: A Just War Defense of the Bombing of Hiroshima. Before all this academic stuff, Marc spent twelve years doing a variety of things in Central Europe—ranging from helping build sport and recreational leagues in post-communist communities, to lecturing on culture, moral philosophy, history, and theology at a study and research center, to leading seminars on history and ethics onsite at the former Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi concentration camp in Poland. This latter experience allowed him to continue his undergraduate study of the Shoah; a process which rendered him entirely ill-suited for pacifism.

Marc lives in Annapolis, Maryland with his wife and children–and a transient marmota monax whistlepigging under the shed. He can be followed, or stalked, on twitter @mlivecche. Additional publications can be found at his Amazon author page. He can be contacted at: mlivecche@providencemag.com

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Ep. 97 | America, Destroyer of Worlds?

Did Truman make the right choice in using nuclear weapons against Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Editor Marc LiVecche makes the case that dropping the bombs was the best option available

Ep. 96 | The West and Weapons of Mass Destruction 80 Years after Hiroshima

The Providence editors discuss the meaning of “Western Civilization” and the legacy of Hiroshima, 80 years later

Ep. 94 | What We Mean by ‘Judeo-Christian’

On June 30th, Providence and Tikvah partnered to convene a panel titled “What We Mean by ‘Judeo-Christian'”

Ep. 93 | The Israeli General Who Predicted Oct 7 – and What He’s Predicting Now (Yossi Kuperwasser)

Marc LiVecche & Robert Nicholson interview Yossi Kuperwasser on the emergence of a new regional security architecture that could bring about dramatic changes in the Near East.

chivalry marines
Combat Ethics, Warrior Ethos, and Moral Injury

If just war tradition requires particular kinds of warriors to fight just wars justly, we owe those particular kinds of warriors particularly kinds of things

Episode 92 | Is America Betraying Middle East Christians?

The Provcast team interview Rich Ghazal, Executive Director of In Defense of Christians, to discuss the question of Christian persecution as it relates to US foreign policy

Episode 91 | Is Israel’s Fight for Survival also America’s Fight?

Dr. Farhad Rezaei joins the Provcast to discuss the hard questions around the Israel-Iran conflict, including escalation, American involvement, and regime change

A Love for Life and Responsible Sovereignty

Israel’s strike against Iran proves that the Western love of life is not our weakness, but our strength. And a means toward responsible statecraft.

Episode 90 | Is There a Trump Doctrine? And What Just Happened in Ukraine

Editors Marc LiVecche, Mark Tooley and Robert Nicholson discuss Trump’s May Middle East trip and Ukraine’s recent drone attacks on Russia’s strategic bombers

Pope Leo
Where Will Leo XIV Stand on War?

The late Pope Francis failed to represent the best of his tradition’s teaching on war and martial responsibility. It is crucial that Leo XIV rectifies this.